Promise

Dad (1971 - My Very First Photo - shot with a Polaroid Model 20 "Swinger")

I was seven years old and as far as I recall it was a warm day. Yes, sometimes in January, in Tuscany, by the sea, we have glorious sunny, warm days. It was Saturday 13 February 1971, a few days after the landing of Apollo 14, a few months before April 24, when five hundred thousand people in Washington, DC and 125,000 in San Francisco would have marched in protest against the Vietnam War.

That day I framed my father in the viewfinder, I waited for the passing couple to be exactly in the middle, and shot. I shot my first photo with my brand new Polaroid Model 20 "Swinger".

This afternoon I kept that photo from the drawer and looked at it, just after having read another time your review. Photography has been a loyal companion in this long, beautiful, sorrowful, magic journey called life. As you said with good words I am entering a new artistic stage, where the old rules, my beloved books, all those imaginary photographies I have taken in the silence of my solitary walks, all those works I have shot and hidden, and those shown here, instantly merge one into another, while I dance through the people acting on the road like it's a huge play, searching for a pov, another one from which tell my story. First time I felt this strange new feeling was in January, when cataract had made me more than half blind, and I insisted in going out and look through that yellowish mist because I knew in a confused way that something was going to happen just in front of my lens.

You are a very sensible man, and a very good photographer who knows what I mean while I say "now I feel like dancing in the street". Did you notice that I titled my last folder walkin' - talkin' blues? This is because I felt like I was dancing while I was shooting. Photography is sensitivity, perception of geometry (God bless H.C.- B. in that interview he said more things with two words and one single gesture than millions of critiques with their pens) sudden eclipse of consciousness, because the image reveals itself in a single, brilliant instant and you get it or it's memory. Oh yes, now I know I can plan the shot, but time, and coincidence no, you cannot plan them, you can only hope that some physical rules will behave like they have always done in the past millennia, and stay there, behind your camera, finger on the trigger, ready.

I thank you, and thank all those good friends who share their wisdom and vision with me, because a big part of my growth is due to constant study and reflection on their works, because this helps me being more severe with my own works (those shot and those that will be). I should also thank my Linguistics Master, Chiarissimo Professor Riccardo Ambrosini, who recently died: he teached me the importance of studying hard and always ask "why?", because natural gifts are nothing if you don't feed them.

This is an emotional writing that I post here with a gift for you: my very first photo. Thank you John, because you have been the very first person who has looked at my work and explained me what is happening inside this photographer's head in these present days. I'll 'go with the force because the force is particularly strong around me' and you have unveiled this to my eyes.

Thank you, Giuseppe

      人们总在工作，同时也在生活，往往人们把它们分开了，因此常觉得工作是生活的负担。而当人们真正的把工作当成一种生活的时候，就如Giuseppe形容的“now I feel like dancing in the street”，这只是一种感觉，用感觉才能描述的感觉。我不能说人人都能热爱自己的工作，因为世事难料，但是当我看完这一段对生活最朴实的描述的时候，我相信生活，即使生活常让人感到痛苦……

      第一次见到他的作品的时候，我就有一种似曾相识的感觉，似乎我一直在找一种思想，找一种感觉，却一直没有找到，所以也就忘却了。而就在那一个不经意间，我看到他的那一张张黑白照片的时候，我找寻的那种东西好像已经出现了，正极力的把我拉向它们。我真的非常感激这样的巧合，让我得到很多。I should say "Thank you!"

      我常常记得对我影响很大的事物，一个人、一句话、一篇文章、或只是一种感觉，正是这些事物构建了我的人生，它们是使我成为我而不是别人的事物。它们有的让人感激，有的让人悲伤，也有的一直影响着我，我非常珍惜这些事物。永远都不会把它们遗忘。

      喜欢他的风格，他总能在平凡的街道上照出真正感动人内心的作品，这正是因为他能找到藏在表面之下内心的真正的生活。

      当工作是一种生活的时候，一切都很不一样。